


and every time i don't (i almost do)

by Lysippe



Series: The Worst Witch 2018 Winter Fluff-A-Thon [18]
Category: The Worst Witch (TV 2017), The Worst Witch - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, day 18: stars, here there be useless lesbians, wherein Hecate and Pippa spent thirty years being too blind to realize they're stupidly in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 22:04:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17067992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lysippe/pseuds/Lysippe
Summary: “I suppose I thought you would think I was silly.” Pippa was staring at her in earnest, now, big brown eyes wide and the tiniest bit self-conscious. “I don’t come up here often, anymore. Just when… well, when the world seems a bit overwhelming, you know?”Hecate did know. She also knew what it meant that Pippa was sharing this space with her, this secret that she had felt the need to keep so closely guarded. And she had so many things she wanted to say, so many questions she wanted to ask, in response. Things like I never think you’re silly, and What has you so overwhelmed that you need to come here to be alone, and Why would you invite me up here, now? Instead, she said, “If I don’t think you’re silly for your unfortunate obsession with the color pink, I certainly will not find you silly for stargazing.”





	and every time i don't (i almost do)

**Author's Note:**

> I forgot how much I actually quite like this one. It's very soft and a little sad and full of Hecate and Pippa being the world's most useless lesbians.

The first time Hecate learned about Pippa’s stargazing, was toward the end of their fourth year. At that point, she was honestly beginning to believe that she knew everything there was to know about Pippa, or, at the very least about her life at school. 

So, when she had gone looking for Pippa and failed to find her, Hecate had grown anxious. Pippa was normally impeccably conscientious about telling Hecate when she had plans, when she was going to spend time with the other witches in their year or stay late practicing flying or anything else that interrupted the near constant company they kept.

_ “Well, I miss you when you’re not around, and I wouldn’t want you to worry,” _ Pippa had said reasonably, the one time Hecate had attempted to tell her that, _ you really mustn’t feel beholden to telling me your every move.  _ Hecate, cheeks flushed, had dropped the matter then, and never brought it up again. 

And so, after searching all of Pippa’s usual haunts (her bedroom, the table in the back of the library, the chanting classroom), as well as some of her more unusual ones (the potions laboratory, the corridor by the kitchens that she sometimes used to sneak sweets, even the hallway where some of her other friends -- and Hecate’s bullies -- were roomed), Hecate resorted, as a last-ditch effort, to sending Pippa a letter on her maglet.

It was nothing, Hecate thought, that would betray her concern. A quick, terse,  _ Is everything alright? _

She hit send before she could stop herself, before she could convince herself that she was being too needy, too clingy. That Pippa might be her only friend, but she wasn’t Pippa’s, and she would do well to respect that a bit more. 

Mercifully, Pippa’s response came before Hecate had the time to fall too far down that particular rabbit hole.

_ I’m on the east wing roof. Come join me? _

Hecate read the message, then blinked, and read it again. The east wing was on the other side of the school, far past anywhere Pippa would normally go. And the roof, while technically accessible, was generally known to be off limits to students. Hecate could think of no reason at all why Pippa would be there. For one brief, horrible moment, it occurred to Hecate that it could be a prank. That one of the other girls in their year had gotten her hands on Pippa’s maglet, and was luring her out to the roof for some new, more creative nastiness than their standard fare.

But, as it so often did, Hecate’s curiosity -- and her desire-bordering-on-need to not let Pippa down -- had her headed in the direction of the east wing within seconds of receiving Pippa’s missive.

When Hecate, a bit winded from speed-walking across the castle, gingerly pushed open the door that led to the stairs up to the roof, she was still half expecting Selena Moonshine to pop out from behind the corner with their form mistress in tow, crowing about how Hecate was breaking rules. But nothing happened -- no bats flying at her face, no irate professors, no crowing classmates -- and Hecate hurried up the stairs, before anything could go wrong.

When Hecate made her way onto the roof and found Pippa, lying quite still on her back, she had a horrible moment in which she thought something might actually be wrong with her. Pippa was normally active and antsy to the point of being troublesome, and the only thing that kept Hecate from running over to check on her was the fact that Hecate had received a perfectly pleasant message from Pippa less than ten minutes before. Instead, she called Pippa’s name, softly, knowing her voice would carry in the silence, knowing Pippa would hear her.

Pippa tilted her head toward Hecate, a wide grin splitting her cheeks.

“Hiccup!” She pushed herself up slightly on her elbows. “I wasn’t sure you would come.” 

Moving in closer now, Hecate saw that Pippa’s cheeks were a good bit pinker than they usually were. She frowned. “I always come.”

Pippa wrinkled her nose. “You do, too. I never have to be without you for long, do I?”

Hecate felt her cheeks begin to warm -- knew that, with as pale as she was, she would be crimson within moments -- and ducked her head, looking away in the hope that Pippa wouldn’t see. 

“You know, I’ve never had company up here before,” Pippa mused. “It’s a bit odd feeling.”

“I can leave,” Hecate offered immediately. Pippa’s invitation had been quite explicit, but Hecate was never one to overstay her welcome without a good reason.

Pippa rolled her eyes and heaved herself up with one great, dramatic sigh. “Oh,  _ honestly _ , Hiccup.  _ I _ invited you here. I’m hardly about to send you away now.”

Hecate shrugged. “I wouldn’t be offended.” Then, as something of an afterthought, “But what, exactly, is it that you are doing up here in the first place?”

Pippa looked confused. “I’m stargazing,” she said plainly, in a voice that told Hecate she clearly felt like this should have been immediately obvious. And, in fairness, perhaps it should have.

Hecate’s face must have shown her confusion, and all of the accompanying questions, because Pippa patted the ground beside her, where the duvet from her bed was spread out, gesturing at Hecate to sit with her. Hecate did, and almost immediately, Pippa took her arm, dragged her back so they were both lying down, and scooted into Hecate’s side. 

“There’s still a bit of a chill in the air, don’t you think?” Pippa asked.

It was a lovely spring evening, one of the warmest in months, and even Hecate, who loathed the cold, couldn’t find any sort of chill to speak of. Nevertheless, she murmured her assent, not wanting Pippa to feel self-conscious. 

“I found this staircase in the second week of our first year,” Pippa began, her voice almost wistful. “It was a mistake, you see. I was trying to get to class, and I was hopelessly turned around, and I followed this staircase--”

“You mistakenly followed a staircase that clearly indicates that it is not meant to be followed?” Hecate asked wryly.

“I did indeed,” Pippa said, ignoring Hecate’s jab. “And  _ anyway _ ,” she continued, a bit wistfully, “I found myself on the roof, and it was so lovely, so calm and peaceful. So, the next time I needed somewhere quiet, somewhere to come and think by myself, I came up here. And I kept coming back.” 

“I never knew.” Hecate tried to ignore the twinge of something that felt like hurt in her chest. She had never known, because Pippa had never told her, and while Pippa was hardly obligated to tell her everything, she usually did anyway. So, why keep this such a secret, for almost four years?

Pippa looked at Hecate curiously. “No, I suppose I never did tell you.”

“May I ask why not?” It was prying, and she knew Pippa owed her no justification, but Hecate couldn’t help herself. Couldn’t help the compulsive need she felt to know everything Pippa had to share with her. To understand every part of Pippa’s mind, her heart, her--

It was a train of thought Hecate had found herself following increasingly and disturbingly more often in recent months. One that led to so many unwelcome thoughts about how soft Pippa’s hands were when she grasped Hecate’s; how pleasant her hair smelled when she snuggled into Hecate like she belonged there, like peonies and rosemary; how warm she always was, where Hecate was always so, so cold. 

They were thoughts that Hecate absolutely could not have. That made her feel a bit ill when she thought too hard on them, nausea roiling in her stomach, anxiety pricking at every nerve ending. And yet, she always thought them anyway.

“I suppose I thought you would think I was silly.” Pippa was staring at her in earnest, now, big brown eyes wide and the tiniest bit self-conscious. “I don’t come up here often, anymore. Just when… well, when the world seems a bit overwhelming, you know?”

Hecate did know. She also knew what it meant that Pippa was sharing this space with her, this secret that she had felt the need to keep so closely guarded. And she had so many things she wanted to say, so many questions she wanted to ask, in response. Things like  _ I never think you’re silly, _ and  _ What has you so overwhelmed that you need to come here to be alone _ , and  _ Why would you invite me up here, now?  _ Instead, she said, “If I don’t think you’re silly for your unfortunate preoccupation with the color pink, I certainly will not find you silly for stargazing.”

Pippa laughed, and Hecate felt it right down in the pit of her stomach. “You’re always so magnanimous, Hiccup.”

“Indeed,” Hecate said mildly. Then, after a pause, “You said you come here to think.”

“I did,” Pippa agreed. 

Hecate took a deep breath, steadying herself for the question she knew she was going to ask, knew she had to ask, that she couldn’t  _ not  _ ask. She was being far too nosy for her own good, but this was a completely new part of Pippa that she had never known, and she couldn’t resist. “What were you thinking about tonight?”

Pippa just gave Hecate an unreadable look, thoughtful and somewhat discomfited. She leaned in, brushed pink-glossed lips against Hecate’s cheek, so light Hecate thought she might have imagined it, but for the whisper of Pippa’s breath against her skin as she murmured, “What, indeed?” before burying her face in Hecate’s shoulder and sinking into her, still and silent.

* * *

Stargazing had always been Pippa’s hobby. Hecate indulged it, of course, as she indulged all of Pippa’s more fanciful qualities -- some days more patiently than others, but always with a focused and concerted effort to remain respectful and open-minded -- but she had never  _ understood _ . 

It escaped her entirely, how Pippa could find it within herself to stay so still, so silent, sometimes for hours on end, just staring at the same stars that were there every night, the same stars that had been there for millennia. The constellations that never changed their shape, only their location in the night sky. To Hecate, always buzzing with nervous energy, it was boredom in its purest form.

It had been years, though -- decades, really -- since Pippa had invited her. And it was a different school this time. Not Amulet’s, but Pentangle’s. Not the east wing roof, but the north tower, which had a ceiling that had been spelled to look like clear glass precisely, according to Pippa, for that reason.

And Hecate, no longer young but just as desperately in love as she had ever been, could never have said no, even if she wanted to.

“To be clear,” Hecate said, announcing her presence, giving Pippa notice that she was no longer alone, “you had this tower designed especially to make your nighttime wanderings more... cozy, did you not?”

And it was cozy. The tower had been decorated with plush blankets and throw pillows of varying shapes and sizes, for the use, Hecate presumed, of any who wished to take up residence there. It had been a point of contention between them, once, Pippa’s fixation on making every part of her school that she possibly could accessible to everyone. But through her own observations and innumerable, surprisingly good-natured, arguments-turned-debates with Pippa, Hecate had come to see the strange logic behind it. Even if she remained unconvinced.

When Pippa turned away from the tower window to face Hecate, her smile was placid, calm like the last time they had met like this. And like the last time, there was something else lingering behind that smile, that Hecate couldn’t quite figure out. “I did, indeed,” she said. “Having a place to go where I could calm my mind helped me so much in those years. I wanted to have someplace like that in my school. Someplace students were actually permitted to go,” she added, wrinkling her nose.

Hecate shifted where she stood, but made no effort to enter. It may have been a public area, but this was still very much Pippa’s space. And despite Pippa’s invitation, Hecate couldn’t help feeling like an intruder. It was only when Pippa waved a hand at one of the blankets -- which unfolded itself from its resting place in the corner and spread across the ground in the middle of the room -- and made her own way over to it, that Hecate entered the room fully, locking the door with a flick of her wrist at her side as she did.

Hecate eased herself onto the blanket, her knees cracking as she sat gingerly next to Pippa.

“I wonder, sometimes, about that night,” Pippa said, almost absently. “Quite often, really.”

Hecate knew, without having to ask, to what night Pippa was referring. Knew that she could only mean the one other instance in which she and Hecate had shared a night under the stars. The night where, Hecate had thought at the time, everything almost changed for them. Except that it hadn’t. 

“What about it?”

Pippa, sitting across from Hecate, a still-respectable distance away, smiled sadly. “If I could have changed things. If I had only…” Pippa paused, looked out at the stars overhead. “If I had only had the nerve to tell you what I wanted to tell you that night, in that moment… if maybe you wouldn’t have left.”

Hecate found herself once again aching for the long-abandoned closeness they had once shared. Of course, their relationship had changed over the years. The days where Pippa would casually take Hecate’s hand, or huddle into her side without needing to ask, were long gone. And what they had gotten back, what they had managed to rebuild, would always be special to Hecate. But it wasn’t that. 

“What was it you wanted to tell me?” she asked, keeping her tone cautiously neutral as best she could. Which, as with many things where Pippa was concerned, was not particularly well.

Pippa’s stare was as indecipherable as it had been thirty years ago. “You really don’t know?” She shook her head, then, and a small sigh escaped her lips. “No, I suppose you don’t. And why would you? I never said it.”

Hecate felt her heartbeat increase, growing harder faster, pounding in her throat as though it was trying to break free. “I never was the most intuitive,” she said, but her mouth was dry, and the words stuck in her throat.

Pippa’s laugh was soft and quiet. “That’s true, at least.” She shifted, moving to lie down on the blanket, face up towards the stars in the perfectly clear sky, but Hecate caught sight of the pink flush creeping into her cheeks before she did. “I was trying to tell you… Hiccup, I was so frightened. I thought you felt the same way, thought I had seen you look at me… that the way you let me in, let me near you… let me touch you, when no one else was allowed…”

Hecate had never heard Pippa at a loss for words before, had never heard her rambling and stammering and unable to put voice to her thoughts in this way. And it terrified her, the thought of what Pippa might be trying to say. And the thought that Pippa might be trying to say something completely different. But she held fast to her silence, to her neutrality, and let Pippa continue on her own.

“And I was so in love with you then, Hiccup. So hopelessly in love, and I’m certain you’ll think that dreadfully silly. I thought that about myself. But when you messaged me that night, and I was already on the roof thinking of it all, it just seemed… like the time to do it, I suppose. Like if the universe were going to send me a sign, it would have been that. And I always wondered if maybe, if I had just told you, if I hadn’t backed out, hadn’t been too afraid… if maybe you would have stayed. With me.”

Hecate had wondered that herself, over the years. What Pippa had been thinking of that night. Why she had looked like she was bursting at the seams to tell Hecate something. What that something might have been.

Now she knew.

And her heart clenched painfully in her chest at the thought that they may never have lost all those years together. That, if Pippa had just said something, or if Hecate had just said something, they could have had all those years together. All the ones they lost. That Hecate had taken away from them. That all of that could have been lost to the mists of time, if one of them had just had the nerve to say  _ I love you _ .

But they hadn’t, and Hecate was still uncertain whether that was what Pippa was trying to say now. Whether she was just feeling nostalgic, or if this was, by some wild miracle, an actual confession. 

“But… why are you telling me this now?” she asked slowly, cautiously, choosing her words with far more care than usual.

“Because…” Pippa started, stopped. Started again. “Because you left, and I thought it was all over, but… I may be completely off my broomstick here, but it feels like I have a second chance now. To tell you. And I know we’re older now, and it’s different, and you and I have built lives apart from one another, lives that neither of us would ever abandon, and… it’s just different.  But I think, sometimes, it isn’t quite so different, after all. That sometimes, I see you looking at me the way you did then. And that maybe, I wasn’t so far off.”

“I understand,” Hecate said slowly. It was the wrong response, and she knew it, but everything was so confusing, so overwhelming. There was too much happening, too much to process, and she needed to tell Pippa that she didn’t just understand. That she felt the same way. Which was far easier said than done  when her heart was fluttering like pixie wings, and her weeks and months and years of training herself out of... _ her feelings _ ...for Pippa, simply wouldn’t let go.

Not that it had ever truly worked. Not that she had ever, truly, been able to let Pippa go. But she had, at the very least, succeeded in building up a whole, fresh new set of walls; a barrier between herself and saying anything too idiotic, too...too  _ personal _ .

Anything like a confession of love for a woman who had, only recently, consented to let Hecate back into her life. Who might simply be waxing poetic, waxing nostalgic, and not, as she feared, in love with her  _ anymore _ .

So, again, like always, she said nothing.

Pippa’s expression, crestfallen and frightened, told Hecate  that this was not the right course of action. That Hecate was, somehow, succeeding in breaking Pippa’s heart,  _ again _ , in pushing her away, in failing to be, as usual, the sort of woman who understood how to appropriately act around  _ feelings. _

“Oh,” Said Pippa, quietly. “It seems, I have…” she smiled, a fake, pained thing that Hecate wanted to magic away, “That I was, in fact, mistaken. I’m sorry, Hecate, I guess I just.” She shrugged, a little sadly. “Well, in any case. I was mistaken, and I apologize. I’m sorry for bringing you here.”

It was, of all emotions, frustration that grabbed Hecate first. That shook her musings, her preoccupation with her own thoughts and feelings, out of her mind, at least temporarily, and pulled her back down to Earth. To where Pippa had, after thirty long years and exactly no help from Hecate whatsoever, decided to bare her heart in the hopes of getting any kind of response at all.

To where Hecate, once again, was breaking her heart.

“You weren’t mistaken,” Hecate said fiercely. “ _ Aren’t _ mistaken.” In a show of familiarity that had been long-lost to time, she reached out and, with a conscious effort at pushing the ferocity she could feel pounding behind her eardrums, took one of Pippa’s hands in hers, squeezing it tightly. “I--”

As always however, the words failed her. As Pippa stared at her, expectant and cautiously hopeful, Hecate could feel the everything she wanted to say dry up in her throat, once again. 

“Hecate…” Pippa said finally, softly, after far too long a silence. She made no motion to extract her hand from between Hecate’s, but her expression morphed into one of quiet frustration. “What do you  _ mean _ ?” 

“I mean,” Hecate said, her own frustration mirroring Pippa’s, “that I have been a terrible coward.”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow.” 

Hecate sighed. Removed one hand from atop Pippa’s and picked absently at the cuticles of one perfectly manicured fingernail. “I spent so much time… back then, and now, trying to… not seem like I was…” She shut her eyes tight, blocking out the world. Took one deep, steadying breath, then two, and three. Pushed down the residual fear from years of burying this particular secret as deep as she could. And when she opened her eyes again, with one last, shuddering breath, Pippa was staring at her, brown eyes wide and concerned, and more full of love than Hecate could ever remember seeing them. “I made… every effort to not let on that I was… quite hopelessly in love with you. I believed… I thought that, if you ever found out, or, far worse, if anyone else ever did… that I would lose you forever. And I pushed those feelings down so far… that I ended up almost losing you forever, anyway.”

Pippa said nothing in response, just took her hand back, and reached up to cup Hecate’s cheek, pulling her in close enough that Hecate could feel the tickle of Pippa’s breath on her lips as she murmured, “We have been  _ dreadfully  _ thick-headed, haven’t we? All those years, all that heartache. And we could have avoided it so easily, if one of us had just worked up the nerve to  _ say something _ .”

Hecate, whose breath had disappeared into wisps of air, could barely find the words to respond. “That would appear to be the case.”

Hecate could feel the tension strumming through Pippa’s body as she drew a ragged breath, her face still only inches away from Hecate’s. “Hiccup?”

Hecate made a noise that sounded like nothing to her, but Pippa must have taken some meaning from it, because she continued.

“I would very much like to kiss you now. If that’s okay with you.”

Hecate, always better with actions than words, simply leaned forward, Pippa’s hands still cupping her cheeks. At the same time as her hand found purchase between Pippa’s shoulder blades, Hecate closed the distance between them, and let out, at last, thirty years worth of longing, and heartache, and so, so much love.

And turned everything to stars.

**Author's Note:**

> Join me on Tumblr @ thebestdressedrebelinhistory


End file.
